Session 65

Do you ever ask yourself “What more can I do for my country”? Sure you have!

Do you ever feel the need deep down to belong? It’s fine, we all do!

Are you proficient with a dagger, sword, bow, or shield? It honestly doesn’t matter!

Can you throw a gnome at least twenty feet without a running start (you, not the gnome)?

If you’ve answered yes to any questions then the Legion of Pergisursia just might be what you are looking for!

We offer the following competitive benefits:

Free Housing

Free Food

Free Training

Cheap Equipment

A Weekly Wage

Apply* in person today!

* All applicants will be put through a rigorous routine that will test their limits, through which the safety of the applicants is not and can not be guaranteed. All applicants must be at least one Dwarf tall to join. Room, board, and training are provided at no charge to members only. Applicants are boarded in communal barracks and are generally of the male persuasion so ladies, keep that in mind if you apply. Also, we weren’t kidding about the gnome thing earlier.

Sessions 55 through 64

Many of you may have been wondering what happened to our adventure logs. I have good news and bad news in regards to them.

The Bad News: I simply don’t have the time that I used to in order to write detailed adventure logs, the last year has been fairly busy for me.

The Good News: Several of our players have continued to keep journals so you can still get the updates as to what trials our daring adventurers have faced.

Just to be clear, I don’t intend to do the adventure logs in this sort of format once I’ve managed to get caught up. In the meantime though this post (and several to follow it) will be using this much shorter format.

Session 54

Excerpt from the advanced text “Azca Et’Zeryx Valt: Roth Ulman” detailing the nature of how Azca pertains to the interactions of planar physics.

“Azca is a powerful force that shouldn’t be trifled with by the untrained. Under certain circumstances and with the correct foci one could inadvertently cause certain unintended interactions affecting the stability of the plane. These interactions can be extremely difficult to anticipate and the consequences can be dire, occasionally qualifying as apocalyptic. Therefore take the following warnings to heart:

In any interaction that uses or requires a form, do not deviate from said form.

Conversely, if a form is not called for do not introduce such a static element to the weft.

Interactions should only be performed in warded and secluded locations such as a containment field.

Transmutation interactions are too dangerous and unpredictable.

Always remember to take amplification into consideration.

Let’s get right to it then. As I’m sure you are already aware planes consist of several layers which are bound to each other by elementary forces. Azca can be used to weaken or strengthen these elementary forces using the following principle:

Used with the theories presented in Azca Alumud C’et Vastrl: Volumes One, Two, and Three it should be readily apparent that even the smallest change may have a much larger impact than initially predicted. This effect is even more pronounced when extended over a duration of time. Standing point foci should generally be avoided for this reason, the Azca Potential generally continues to grow for as long as the foci is present. The exception to that would be if the foci itself was inside of a containment field (as it should be). The containment field should severely dampen the amplification effect of the foci (which is the generally intended purpose of a stasis wave-fluctuation based containment field after all), nearly cancelling out the amplification entirely. This allows you to extend the duration of your interaction dramatically.

Take note though. Obviously the amplification cannot be entirely nullified, to do so would render the foci pointless. Given that information a foci securely contained within a stasis wave-fluctuation based containment field must still steadily amplify the Azca Potential. If left unchecked eventually one of two things is accepted to happen; either the plane is bled dry of Azca entirely (leading to mass extinction), or the foci will fail catastrophically (in which case I sincerely hope that your containment field is very strong).

Azca scholars aren’t entirely sure what happens should the containment field fail. Obviously the accrued Azca would breach the field, that much can go unsaid, but what effect would manifest from such a breach is most unpredictable. The best case scenario is that a conduit with the astral plane is formed, acting as an enormous vent for the energy. The cataclysmic Azca backlash that devastated the plane of Athas might be considered a worst case scenario by some, I feel that the denizens of Athas may have gotten off lucky considering the circumstances.

Session 53

They did it. I would’na believe it if I had’na been there meself. Them shaman greens made a door’a black, it goes what knows?

They do. Aye, they knows, it being made by them and all. Built a tomb around it they did with a door of unscratchable. Left a pile of dead greens inside. I know because I was in there, I’na seen anything of the like. Terrible omens await them that built this place. Them shaman greens will die w’in a fortnight or I’m not a dead goblin. Maybe they already dead. Maybe that bit on the other side of the black killed them right when they crossed over. Maybe they the lucky ones. Them D’mans and their like are drawing ever closer.

Still though, them shaman greens beat the big d’man. Huge as a tree he was, always shrouded in a smoke fire. Big molten iron eyes he had.I’ve seen his kind before, come from down in the depths of Oster’toth. Nasty lot that.

Maybe I stay here, keep a watch over the door of unscratchable. If the D’mans figure out how to open’t it would’na serve. Maybe I stay here, guard this place, keep out the D’mans.

Session 52

They watched his fight with the flaming demon from the fire in the center of the village. Nearly all of the tribe was there to watch their chieftain die at the hands of the beast. The shaman had been able to scry the creature using the flames once the tribe on the other side of the portal had given them a name.

A’ki.

None could have guessed it would be A’ki. He was supposed to be a great hero who fell fighting the darkness centuries ago in the Abyss. Here he was now to put a violent end to everything he touched. It didn’t make any sense.

Chief Razimuth landed the first blow, slashing at A’ki somewhat clumsily but managing to keep his distance.

The shaman knew what had to be done and the preparations had already been underway. There was a legend that the lords of the Abyss couldn’t see innocence. If A’ki came from the Abyss perhaps he too shared their weakness. The fight between A’ki and Chief Razimuth confirmed their suspicions, A’ki seemed to be blind to Chief Razimuth’s attacks.

A great gate would be erected to hold the corruption and the monster that brings it at bay. It would be a magical gate, brought from the other side of the portal by volunteers who could never return to their homes. The gate would be built into the entrance of the cave and enchanted using the blood of the innocent. This was their best chance at keeping the monster from accessing wherever it was that the gate led to.

Chief Razimuth had landed several blows against A’ki, drawing blood several times. He saw an opening from behind the monster, leaping onto its back and stabbing savagely. A’ki stumbled and fell from the impact, Chief Razimuth landing just a few feet in front of him. A’ki cocked his head to the side at the sound of Razimuth’s landing, then reached out abruptly and caught the chief directly in the face with his fist. Chief Razimuth staggered to the side, spitting out teeth and coughing. A’ki stood tall and reached down to the source of the sound, picking Chief Razimuth up by his skull using just his massive armored gauntlet and dangling him ten feet above the ground.

A’ki chuckled sinisterly, then closed his fist. A moment later Razimuth’s headless twitching form dropped to the ground and A’ki limped away.

Session 51

Contact had been made, the people from the other side of the portal were lizardfolk.

They had hacked his people to pieces like that even though they were one and the same? Chief Razimuth had been rendered unable to even speak for a moment when the shaman told him why they had done such a horrible thing.

“There isn’t anything that is allowed to pass through the portal.”

That had been the extent of the discussion, nothing else was given as a means of explaining the atrocity that they had committed against his people, his father.

Razimuth wept for his people and his grief, but something kept nagging at him. That wording had been very particular. Why not just say that nothing was allowed through the portal? The answer struck him almost immediately, “Nothing” wasn’t allowed through either. They were guarding the portal against the sickness of the land that destroyed everything it touched. They were guarding it against the monster in the jungle. Razimuth knew that his people would not escape, the thing would annihilate them all.

Could nothing be done? Must they simply wait to die? No. Razimuth had had enough. He gathered the council and told them that he was going out to drive the monster off. He knew he couldn’t hope to slay the beast but perhaps he could wound it enough that it would seek an easier target elsewhere. Maybe he could buy his people enough time to escape.

He grabbed his father’s greatspear and bade farewell to his people, naming the wisest of the shaman as the new chief should he fail to return.

Session 50

Chief Astenfang was dead, her remains a gory mess that stretched at least ten feet in every direction from where she had tried to take a stand. The monster had crushed her like she was made of rotting fruit, then turned and simply walked away.

Razimuth had tried to stop her. The thing in the jungle was far more powerful than anything that his tribe had ever encountered before. It stood over twenty feet tall, bristling with muscle and seemingly made of smoke. Razimuth had been the first to see the monster coming, seeing it from his post in the watchtower because the beast’s flaming red eyes made it plainly visible in the eternal twilight that now blanketed the land. He had even tried picking up his father’s greatspear but he was still weak to wield it effectively. If only they had more time to prepare maybe this could have gone differently.

He thought about it for a moment. No, that would have gone no differently if we’d had fifteen years to prepare. That thing appeared to be unstoppable and had to be avoided or else all was lost. The others were looking to him now for leadership since many of the more elder lizardfolk were in no state to do much of anything other than wail uncontrollably. The others were dutiful warriors and fearful fathers, great at taking orders but terrible at giving them.

Razimuth’s first act as chief of the tribe was to call the council of shaman, peaceful contact had to be made with the people from the other side of the portal.

Session 49

Razimuth was crestfallen when he heard the news. The scouting party that Chief Astenfang had sent through the portal had been slain, their bodies tossed unceremoniously back through the portal to lay in a heap of limbs, heads, tails, and torsos. Razimuth took the news especially hard as his father, Akker’roth the great warrior of the Sunscale tribe, had been among those who would never look upon their homeland again.

To make matters worse the light of the titan seemed to be growing fainter each day, now twisting the landscape like it had twisted the hatchlings and elders previously. Even the plant life was affected, gnarling, withering, and blackening like the sky. Something truly horrible was happening here, something that Razimuth didn’t think his people would be able to escape. Chief Astenfang had been wary but hopeful when Razimuth had given her the news of the portal’s discovery, that hope had turned to ash when she saw what had become of her scouts. No more would be sent, the tribe couldn’t spare the men. Every day the bounty of the land became smaller and smaller. Less animals appeared in the jungle, less fish were in the water, less birds were in the sky.

Session 48

Razimuth raced down the cave, brimming with excitement over his discovery. Chief Astenfang would surely see the value of this, she had to, it was monumental. Literally.

Razimuth snickered at his joke to himself as he jogged outside the cave complex. He had been exploring deep beneath the surface in the sub-level of the cavern where the shaman council had made their proclamation of power a few days ago. They had been searching for a new source of raw Azca since the sun went dim to perhaps reverse the calamity; his people worshiped the light of the titan and it had nearly gone out around twenty days ago.

That had been a very bad day, one that Razimuth hoped he would be able to forget. He had seen horrible things happen to the children and elders, their twisted forms and shrieks still haunted his dreams.

He shivered involuntarily at the memory. He was almost home now, the cave wasn’t far from the tribe’s riverside village. Soon he could tell Chief Astenfang about the portal. The portal would be their salvation.

Session 47

The master looked at them quizzically.
“Ah, yes. Welcome home little ones. I trust that the intruders have been adequately dealt with?”

They globbered in unison excitedly.

The master seemed less than amused at their antics.
“What do you mean by that precisely? Am I to assume that they have not been killed?”

G’Hauth glurried to the master in a dismissive fashion.

The master eyed G’Hauth wearily.
“So you let them escape. Are you sure that they have gone from our lands? We will have much bigger problems to deal with if word of our little enclave here reaches the elementals.”

G’Hauth floopily willomied, using a pseudopod to draw a crude map on the ocean floor. G’Hauth gesticulated towards the map, emphasizing the trail away from the ancient ruins near the shoreline.

The master closed all three of his glowing orange eyes, nodded, and bid them to leave his sanctum.